We are working in the field of Agro Electronics since 25 years in India with major thrust on ICT for Irrigation by the brand, Nano Ganesh- A Mobile Based Remote Control System for the Water Pumps. During the course of this big time phase, we came across so many challenges faced by the farmers and they sought for the solutions. In all the ways, ICT was a major solution to solve their problems. I am listing and describing briefly how ICT is a magic for the farmers in sustainable crops.

It may be interesting and entertaining too while reading few of unbelievable ICT applications we have provided or witnessed in Indian horticulture. There are so many ICT applications but the following are few universal ones to throw light on the various possibilities.

1. Electronics Fencing for Banana Plot - The electronics fencing of galvanized wire along the perimeter of the farm of two to three acres having a banana plantation. This fencing has been charged by a high voltage such that it is not fatalistic but will provide a mild shock to animals or even a human being.The alert can be sent to the farmers mobile phone if there is some attempt of a breach.

2. Wild Animals Voice Sound Generator for areca nut and banana- In Goa State of India and forest prone agriculture area, there is a big challenge of monkeys spoiling the areca Nut and banana plantation. They easily cross the electronics fencing but are scared due to the loud sound of tiger or elephant. But, these monkeys are so clever that once they get acquainted with the cycles of the sounds, they are not scared. So, there are few ICTs in India creating different sounds at different time cycles so as to confuse the monkeys. The sounds are generated by an amplifier powered by solar and controlled by Remote control.

3. Weather forecast alert for Grapes and Mangos - In India, many times there is a weather change in the month of December when the flowers of mangos have just started blossoming. Sometimes in the month of March, the winds destroy the flowers of mango tending to huge loss of yield. Similarly, showers in December cause a big loss to budding grapes. A few years ago, it was a direct loss, but now with the help of weather forecast from different ICT service providers, farmers can proactively work on the coverings, emergency medicines, temporary curtains etc. to avoid the loss of flowers and buds.

4. Moisture Sensors in Drip Irrigation connected to Cloud (IOT)- The yield depends on the adequate quantity of water to the horticulture products. Accurate sensor controlled water through drip and sprinklers irrigation has helped a lot to Grape Growers in Nasik Region of Maharashtra State in India. The amount of water can be measured per day in winter, summer as well as sensed by the moisture sensors. There is a huge saving of water, soil minerals due to controlled irrigation. Wireless monitoring and controlling of irrigation has been achieved with the help of Nano Ganesh system.

5. ICT in Green House - Many rose gardens and strawberry farms in Western Maharashtra are developed in the controlled weather created by Green House Net sheds. Temperature, irrigation, humidity, light radiations etc. are controlled with the help of different equipment with ICT intelligence. Everything is well monitored from the urban office of the grower.

6. Sorting of fruits (Color, size, smell, weight etc.) - It is a tedious job to sort out the fruits as per color, size, quality and smell. I have seen some photo sensing machines as well as size sorters run with a full automation which gives fruits sorted out in different boxes along with an output in the form of digital data sent to the computer terminal.

7. Sequential timers for irrigation - If there are say 10 plots to be irrigated with less capacity of the water pump, every plot is irrigated one by one with solenoid valve control and water sensors. This data is put to the cloud for analytics.

8. Electrical Motor Pump Burning Prevention Device with alert - There is a big loss of yield if a water pump is burnt due to erratic power in the peak period. There is a vast network of the pumps and electrical cables in the agriculture farms burning of motors tend to not only headache of irrigation but expenses in repairs, logistics and time loss. In India, almost 80% water pumps are equipped with ICT protection devices to prevent burning of motors and sending alerts on mobile phones if any voltage or current crosses the limits.

9. Communication with the overseas market for Grapes - Farmers have now efficiently established the communication with the domestic and overseas market. They can take a wise decision in the group or an individual about driving the products to the logistics network.

10. Health-care of plants and soil - Though it is still in incubating stage, ICT for the health care of plants and soil mineral contents are being on the way to farmers. In sugarcane belt in India, the contents of the particular soil minerals have been totally diluted tending to loss of fertility of the soil due to overwatering. ICT role is important to diagnose the minerals in the plants as well as soil material. Different electronics sensors along with chemical processes are most useful in deciding the fertilizers input to the soil.

11. Postharvest Management and storage - Temperature data of refrigeration and storage along with data of control and monitoring during the logistics as well as static storage is a vital sector of ICT applications.

There are so many localized ICT innovations used in the agriculture that few of them seem to be really scalable across the globe.

I am going to share a thrilling journey of Nano Ganesh ICT and how it took an impactful shape in the time line of 25 years and made a drastic socio-economic change in the irrigation operations in rural sector in farming as well as drinking water supply management in the villages..

Nano Ganesh is an electronics hardware + software GSM device integrated with the existing switch gear of electric water pumps and can be accessed by a mobile phone from any place for the purpose of controlling and monitoring.

After installing Nano Ganesh device at the water pump end
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1. A farmer can switch on /off the water pump with the help of a mobile phone from any distance..
2. He understands on his mobile phone the on-off status of the power and pump
3. Farmers get alert messages on his mobile phone about different events about pump operations..
4. In few latest models, Nano Ganesh can be connected to a server for cloud based services like analytics.

Hence, farmers are not needed to physically visit the hazardous distant pump sites in the remote locations for controlling and monitoring of the water pumps. .

Background - The whole story of Nano Ganesh ICT evolutions is basically to solve the problems of the farmers in controlling the water pumps.

The challenges faced by the farmers and ICT developer were almost the same.

1. Distant locations of the water pumps in hazardous areas near river, wells, ponds, lakes etc.
2. Difficult terrains through dense plantation or cultivation.
3. Fear of animals on the way to water pumps.
4. Erratic power due to heavy density of electricity distribution in the irrigation zones.
5. Odd hours or night operation schedules due to availability of the power during night hours.
6. Shock hazards due to wet area and electricity leakages near the water pump.
7. Every season is the challenge for accessing the water pump - Rains, scorching heat, winter.
8. Expenses on travelling - an operator, motor bike, and fuel etc.
9. Fear of theft of water pumps and accessories like cable, panel and starters etc. and consequent incidences to replace the whole stuff.                                                                                                    

To address these challenges of the farmers in accessing the water pumps,we started with low cost electronics devices in 1991 to automatically control the water pumps.The Initial pioneering phase  of eight to ten years was filled with all odds for an entrepreneur to be sustainable. The real need of the farmers was identified and fine tuned in 1998 - Farmers preferred low cost remote controlling devices for the water pumps instead of complicated PLC based systems. 

With low range radio frequency based remote controllers in 1998, the technology took a revolutionary shape of unlimited range remote controller with the help of a mobile phone in 2004 and went on improving every year after that to the latest cloud based version in 2016.

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Though the technology evolution was important, the field implementation and business model is quite a learning part which I would cater subsequently in the coming days.

Nano Ganesh ICT has been selected as the best mobile innovation for the emerging market by Nokia. GSMA has featured  it at different platforms. It has been validated under India Innovation Growth Programme hosted by FICCI and The Government of India. The State Government of Karnataka has considered Nano Ganesh as a part of m-Governance programme. The success story of Nano Ganesh has been published by FAO in 2015.

I feel that a real success is - More than 50000 farmers in India have accepted Nano Ganesh ICT as a life changing technology and many are on the way.

Considering the severe challenges for adoption of ICT in the remote places with assurance of prompt delivery, support and healthy performance for 3 to 5 years at low cost, a business and finance model is necessarily a special one.

Speciality of the Rural Market –

The main USP of the rural market is that the farmers are facing so many challenges needing life changing support in different forms out of which the technology is a major one.

Huge market potential with exponetial growth rate and dramatic socio-economic impact is a promising driving factor to invest in this sector.

ICT for villages saves different elements like unwanted expenses, energy resources, time, labor along with convenience and comforts assuring healthy yield in agriculture production.

The farmer’s class is very much sensitive and well aware of their problems. They accept the technology solutions very positively only after a trust is built along with larger time cycles and commitment of the brands to serve the rural community. e.g. In India, Jain Irrigation Systems pioneered the work in drip and sprinklers irrigation since 80’s with commitments and today they control the major share of the Indian market.

Few points on the business and finance -

1. Various Partnerships - The business model has to consider different alliances in various fields e.g. partnership with telecom partner, electronics manufacturer, educational institutes, NGOs, government, established rural brands, engineering contractors and so many...!

2. 4 P Model - As introduced in my previous part of Q5, the successful formula is of 4 Ps i.e.Public, Private, People Partnership.

3. Social Entrepreneurship or Impact business where expectations are to build business for profit or no profit model for the benefit of the society, saving of material resources, socio-economic change among on scalable, profitable & sustainable basis.

4. Speed in scalable adoption after pilot project is done

5. Involvement of education institutes in building and executing business plans

6. Patient funding is adequate in majority of social-entrepreneurship cases

7. Finance Literacy - ICT enabler must be FINANCE LITERATE beyond his technical capabilities.

Hope there are so many other evolutionary aspects and recommendations for ICT for Resilience. It would be always good for all to share individual experiences and insights on this forum.

My cheers to E-Agriculture community...!

The fundamental approach towards use of ICT for resilience in agriculture is different in every aspect as compared with other products or services for urban, domestic and industrial use. Though the products are same, tones for rural use must be appropriate considering simplicity, robustness,  multi-fold illiteracy, need of bigger life cycle of products, local support, moderate cost and adequate training.  Here is the budding of innovations which is the key of success. An innovative thought always pops up when there are severe constraints. In India, there are thousands of local innovations in the rural sector of which few having.long term scalable business model could succeed.

I refer to our own case of Nano Ganesh - first version in 2004 – For achieving longer distance range of remote control for water pumps, we innovatlvely used Nokia feature phone as a low cost wireless device near hazardous river beds. In first instance, Nokia officials could not even believe it. It was awarded as the Best Mobile Innovation for emerging markets in 2009 by Nokia in Barcelona.and gained popularity among farmers too.

For recommendations of use of ICTs for resilience, I think that it will be convenient to refer the list of dos and don’ts for the following different dimensions –

1. Use of 4 Ps model – A proven model for ICT success for resilience

Public (Government, Institutions) - Private (ICT enabler company) – People (NGOs, Local technicians and user) Partnership

2. Innovative approach in every segment of operations –

Innovation in the technology, ways of operations, adoption, training, cost reductions, use etc. wherever possible.

3. Appropriate Product design approach, R&D –  

Appropriate technology, easy to use irrespective of education, gender, age and language, robust for 3-5 years performance, moderate cost etc. are important while developing the product supported by continuous upgrading of the technology as per the market demand and evolution.

4. Strong need of infrastructure for local training & support for speedy adoption –

Mechanism for in-plant and on-site training to user and local technicians is must for building self confidence in use of ICT.  Use of latest communication techniques, videos, literature, call centre has to be efficient enough to handle user’s queries 24x7.

5. Continuous feedback of users in the product life cycle -

Pains of the user and their aspirations must be understood including emotional, mental and psychological impact.

6. Empowering farmer’s internal capacity for positive attitude with different inspiration processes.

7. Agro Electronics Commando – Establishing a network of village technicians who are adequately trained for the assured operation and maintenance of ICT. DO PLAN for Local Support Team and AVOID expenses in travelling and resources.

8. Need of innovative ways for reducing the expenses on promotion & marketing – Effective use of media, internship for educational students, R&D from engineering institutes, social  media and programmes, CSR funding , participation in different exhibitions, government supported schemes etc. always help to reduce the heavy burden of expenses on advocacy and promotion activities.

9. Building of Social Entrepreneur Business model – Use of technology for the social impact on a larger scale always needs to be driven with mission and passion.

10. Permanent emotional connections with the community – A top secret for ICT success in villages. It should be the long term commitment with ourselves to serve the rural community which is sometimes beyond short term profits but assuring life time happiness and peace.

I shall add few more in the second phase very shorlly.

Though ICT for Resilience has so many challenges discussed in the last question, it does not mean that a bowl is empty. There is a need to anticipate the challenges and build strategies of delivery model. I hope that the following approach for HOW TO START WITH for ICT based resilience project will be surely a good reference for any ICT project and any country.

I am sure that it will be helpful for new comers as well as strategists for understanding the fundamental steps which will reduce the time of field trials as well as resources.

1. Different ICTs or specifications for the same idea but different farmer segments –

A particular ICT application can’t be standardised for all segments. After a basic idea or innovation of ICT is decided, it should be tested against the real requirements and problems of the farmers in the targeted segments based on geography, education, telecom connectivity, urban connectivity, crops pattern, seasonal, finance etc. A progressive class of farmers can afford to adopt costly equipment while small holder farmers can go for the low cost options with moderate features e.g a grape grower can afford computerised irrigation for the water pumps whereas a small grain growing farmer will go for low cost remote controller for pumps.

2. Priority-wise select a marketing segment and related ICT solution such that maximum number of farmers would be benefited (Decide Target and addressable Market Potential )

After deciding a particular ICT solution or an idea for the particular segment, a three stage strategy is must to proceed with – 1.Understanding of the existing problems 2. Involving farmers in the discussions with tentative idea of ICT solutions helps creating a wonderful ground for the upcoming trials and pilot projects 3. Understanding their aspirations about the ICT solutions based on different parameters like cost, utility, buying period, dependability on ICT etc. The selected solution must be offered for the market life cycle of at least three to four years considering the dynamic evolution of the ICTs from the laboratories. Please note that speedy implementation is the key of success.

3. Tune the coarse idea of ICT for a pilot field run in at least three regions involving selected pioneer class of farmers willing to provide timely feedback on the use and performance. Next stage is to fine tune the solution within the stipulated time frame based on the user’s feedback considering the simplicity of use, performance in different weather conditions, electricity effects etc.  This stage is crucial where the solution has to be rigorously tested for the robust performance in which every stakeholder contributes towards fine-tuning process of the ICT solution. 

4. Building up of a scalable, sustainable, profitable business model is the next process considering the different factors like cost effective advocacy, local availability, post-sales support and hands-on experience on fields. This must consider the different external factors like climate, telecom infrastructure, human limitations, and local communication for building the strategies of GO TO MARKET.

5. There is active involvement of three partners for the successful implementation – Private Sector as the technology enabler, The Government or NGOs as the Catalysts and rural population for the actual use along with operation & maintenance.

6. Business Model – To implement ICT for the rural sector involves socio-economic aspects and it is a social entrepreneurship rather than a conventional professional business models.

Please see the following value chain diagram based on which Nano Ganesh ICT has been successfully adopted in India, of course with a room kept for evolution.

I want to describe here in details the live experience of Nano Ganesh ICT implementation in India and how we had to improvise our strategies from time to time with maintaining the basic goal constant.  Constraints faced by us were outcome of the basic ground realities in the farm irrigation. As Nano Ganesh ICT is based on the effective mobile connectivity, all factors associated with the telecom infrastructure are vital in the effective operation of ICT. But, beyond these,,there were so many other controlling factors in the rural sector which decided the success of ICT.

 Please refer the following facts which generated the constraints in adopting Nano Ganesh ICT -

1. Irregular electricity in villages in the emerging market – It was difficult to demonstrate, install, test and commission the products during the day time due to erratic power.
2. Difficult terrains approaching towards the pumping installations – Field engineers faced logistics challenges during odd hours. Many times the engineers had to walk down a distance of 5 to 10 kms towards the pump sites.
3. Resistance of the technocrats to work in the rural sector. There was a need of dedicated and passionate techies committed to work for a mission.
4. Extreme hazardous conditions at the water pump sites – The pump area is wet and shock prone. There are animals like snakes, rats, panther etc. near the water zone.
5. Telecom infrastructure challenges in rural area - We had to spend a lot on boosting the wireless range with the use of external antenna in deeper pockets, vallies and hilly sites.
6. Illiterate user class and stubborn conventional mindsets – A pump operator does not break the conventional shell of routine laborious routine to adopt the modern technology. Huge pioneering efforts are consumed in building confidence among them for the use of ICT.
7. Heavy expenditure on advocacy, marketing, advertisements, promotion, training, after sale support etc. These expenses drain a huge margin of the revenues.
8. Aspirations of farmers increased due to awareness programs and technology advancements without revenue traction.
9. Challenges in generating Investment for the expansion - Generating a sustainable and scalable business model was a real challenge to convince the investors due to heavy expenditure in the point no. 6 above.
10. Low cost needs- Considering the heavy cost and time incurred in the R&D as well as promotion campaigns, the practical cost aspired by the farmers and breakeven cost of the entrepreneurs did not match. In spite of pay-back period of only three months,  capital investment  expectation was too low in the initial phase as farmers did not want to take risk on new products.
11. Buying inertia is high - More time was consumed to percolate the product into the market. This did not fit into the finance calculations of the investors.
12. Business revenues are down in the period of summer and rainy season. It is a big challenge to arrange for the specific business model to engage the work force for optimum production in this period.
13. Expenses in advocacy of the energy and resources importance - As energy elements like water and energy are provided at subsidized cost or almost free, the precious value of these energy resources is not being acknowledged and there is a huge wastage of energy elements. A big investment in terms of time and advocacy is incurred in convincing these facts before the promotion of the products.
14. Competition due to local short term players after  techhology is accepted – As huge time is invested in pioneering the technology, local competition starts when the real business and revenues start building up. This consumes heavy investments in fighting  against the short term players who spoil the market and run away from the battle field.
15. Unpredictable purchase cycle due to unpredictable natural disaster, falling of market rates, government policies etc. - During the marketing and promotion of the products, the farmers appreciated and shown the interest in the ICT but did not buy the product by his own financial or any un predicted reasons. Even after paying 25% of booking amount, they did not turn to buy the product till 2-3 years.
16. Implementation rate of ICT on the field is too slow as compared to the ICT evolutions day by day. There is a big gap in the technologies evolution and their implementation. Please read the blog on the Challenges in this website only. Here is one live example how we had to change as per the market situation during 2009. We used Nokia 1200 basic mobile phone (2.5 mm headset socket) for Nano Ganesh integration. We demonstrated it in Mobile World Congress, Barcelona in the innovator competition held by Nokia and we were announced The Grand Winner. But, when we returned to India after a huge achievement, a news was in the Indian mobile phone market that Nokia 1200 model has been discontinued and it was a big blow to us. We had a big loss and had to re-integrate with new mobile devices with 3.5 mm jack. In the next blow, we had to discontinue these models and switchover to new designs after Nokia feature phones were out of rural market from 2014.

The above list of constraints indicates the volatile conditions and how much difficult it is to implement ICTs in the rural sector.  One can easily understand why it is important to build a specific business model which takes care of mitigating above challenges and riding swiftly against the unpredicted  rural dynamics. We shall surely discuss the mitigations and success factors in the next topics.

In spite of all above challenges, I personally feel that its a thrill to work for ICT for Resilience because ultimately we are serving the population who fights against all odds for bringing food on our table.  It is an exciting experience to receive a word of appreciation and blessings when ICT serves them effectively and..... here is a start of a different loop of success for the further growth.    

Today the overall population's life style and expectations are almost connected with luxury cars, shopping malls, communication tools with extreme comforts. But, we are forgetting the class of population who is bringing food on our table, who is fighting against all odds for producing meals for us.

We have to look not into only improving agriculture but their personal life too in all dimensions. We have to empower the farmers with different aspects like material, emotional support, education, health and soical inclusion. We have to put energy to their life in such a way that they will work on the farms with happy mood, enthusiasm and love. They should be given an awareness and feeling that they are the only class of people who feeds the whole world. The building up of confidence among them will be automatically a positive driving factor in their routine work.

In a simple language, resilience means to energise...to refresh...to blossom the farmers from inside out from person, family and farms. ICT role is quite vital and crucial in different farm activities , family welfare and overall life style. ICT for information, education, entertainment, controlling, monitoring, communication, savings, health care of man-animal-machine....etc. There is a big list of proven ICT technologies which are already beiing used by urban and industries but with some imporvisations can be used for solving the problems faced by the farmers. There is a need to build an appropriate ICT by understanding the problems of the farmers from their perspective. There is a need to understand the challenges in the implementation. 

Once the real life of the farmers is understood, the list of ICTs and innovations which can be used to empower the farmers will be surely an unending matter. There are different proven applications like ICT for dairy farms, Nano Ganesh for controlling and monitoring irrigation, different videos, ERP platforms, data-cloud services etc. about which ample material has been already published across the web. But, the need is to scale-up the activities for deeper penatration of ICTs beyond pilot projects.

Hope, with these primary inputs, forum is gearing up...! My best wishes to all participants who are keen to work for the benefit of the farmers....!